Typhoon Ketsana (“Ondoy”) Memories
It’s been over a week since Typhoon Ketsana (Philippine name: “Ondoy”) came and inundated large parts of Metro Manila. I assume that most people around the world already know the statistics: close to 300 people dead in the Philippines (I understand that there are at least over a hundred more dead in Laos and Vietnam after Ketsana left these shores and headed over there), thousands still in evacuation centers and homeless, losses to properties (from homes and cars which went underwater due to the flashfloods caused by the rains) in the millions or probably billions of pesos by now.
The reason I haven’t posted anything much is that nothing happened to me or my family. We are safe, dry and with our property intact. We were living in a state of blissful ignorance that day and that night (September 26 to 27) - it was, truth to tell, an “ordinary day” as far as we were concerned, except for the fact of heavy rains much of the day and night, and power outage which occurred at around 4 in the afternoon of September 26 and lasted until around 2 pm the following day.
The only ‘inconvenience’ we had was that our LPG tank ran out the day before and - with the power out - we had to fall back on sandwiches, boiled saging na saba (Philippine cooking bananas; the closest apparently is plantains) which we had bought earlier and cooked before the lights went out, and biscuits, crackers and chips. Illumination was by candles - again, a lucky thing since my wife was so fond of decorating with candles - and since the wind was brisk and cool, all we had to do was keep the windows open and it was quite, quite comfortable. The only thing was that our cell phones had run out of their battery charge; again, the lack of electricity meant we were out of touch.
Until the next day (Sunday, 27 September) when necessity forced us out of our comfortable cocoons. Still no electricity so even boiling water for the morning coffee was out of the question (luckily, our next door neighbors who were my uncle and aunt had a gas-fired oven so we were able to ‘borrow’ the water) and man, woman and boy cannot live on bread, crackers and chips for long.
The phone to the LPG company was out so I felt we had no choice but to go out place an order for delivery of our normal 50-kilo tank. It wasn’t raining as hard anymore so my wife and I thought, “Why not? Joy ride … may as well go out and buy some groceries and the like).
So … out we went. First stop was the LPG store which was a few blocks away. They were open and willing to have a tank of LPG delivered and installed in an hour or so. Great! And off we went to the nearby Mercury Drugstore - a combination pharmacy and grocery/convenience store (the branch along Retiro Street in QC is 24 hours) - where my son and I picked a few cans of sausages, sardines and other things … and realized that the line to the cashiers was long, looonngg, so very, very long. (I think there were some 50 or so people waiting in line, and all of them were packed to the gills with the items they were buying - everything from noodles to canned goods to candles and soap and rubbing alcohol bottles).
I told my son (Mico) and wife (Arlene) to put the items back; rather than wait it out, may be better to go to another convenience store nearby where there wouldn’t be that much of a line.
So off we went …
And started noticing a few things.
For one, when we got to the grocery store (around a kilometer away from the house), it was “closed.” Or rather, the doors were open because the staff were inside trying to assess the damage - the whole ground floor of the establishment got flooded and foodstuffs, canned goods and everything else were scattered all around.
One thing about that grocery store - they were in a flood-prone area so their building was somewhat ‘elevated’ - the ground floor was around three to four feet above street level. So how the hell could flood waters get in? Unless … it meant that the floods were that high …
All right, I said - next stop. Another convenience store - Save and More, part of the SM supermarket chain - was only a few minutes away, at the corner of Araneta Avenue (sometimes called the C-3 highway) and Del Monte Avenue. Same story - store closed because flood waters had entered the building. Where to next? We decided to drive around the neighborhood for a bit to work out what to do next …
As we were driving, my son (who was riding shotgun) asked - “Pa, what’s that?”
I didn’t realize what it was until my son pointed it out - all along the street, plastic bags and other garbage were festooning the trees. Passing by some houses, I realized that I was seeing plastic bags and garbage (styropor boxes, leaves and other trash) sticking to second floor windows and walls. Along one street where the houses had 10 feet high concrete fences topped by another five feet of barbed wire fence were literally covered with the same plastic bags and garbage sticking all the way from the ground to the top strand of barbed wire.
There was only one thought on our minds: WTF HAPPENED HERE?
For all that garbage to reach that high meant that the floods were that high - at least 10-15 feet. I’ve been living in the area for years and know it gets flooded but the worst it ever got was waist deep - this was at least four times higher than that! What the hell was happening here?
It was only later when the electricity came back on and we were able to communicate again (cable TV news, internet was on) that we realized the extent of the devastation that happened.
One video on YouTube put up a few days ago shows this better than words would:
This is a car repair shop around a kilometer or so from where we live - and close to the above-mentioned Araneta Avenue which is flood-prone but (as I said) it only goes waist deep as far as I can remember. This is much, much worse - as you can see, the cars were all lifted up but it still went to their roofs. All in the space of one afternoon … and this is only one such place in the metropolis.
Looking back on it all now, I can only shake my head … and thank my lucky stars and my grandparents for choosing our home so many decades ago. I had never really thought about it but our home is situated on an upwardly sloping location. Terrain wise, I think our portion of Quezon City has small, rolling hills - which was why, as the rains kept falling down, we were all snug and dry and totally oblivious to what was happening around us. The only inconveniences we went through was having no LPG for cooking, no electricity (which meant no TV, internet or other entertainment and no communications with all cell phones conking out) … and total, blissful isolation.
With the lights back and communications restored, I started checking around on friends and family members … but there were very few responses. My first thought was that they had gone through the same thing - no lights, no battery charging, no communications. Nothing I can do, I thought, except gather the old clothes, put together some things and be ready to bring them over to relief centers if needed.
It was only starting Monday when I went to the office that things began to get clear. Luckily, none of my officemates and colleagues suffered casualties among their families. Property damage, on the other hand …i several had floodwaters entering their homes; several had to go to the rooftops and wait for the waters to subside; another had water starting to enter the second floor of their home; others reported only waist deep or knee deep water. Most, however, were quite safe and did not experience too much trouble or inconvenience …
I don’t know how I should feel right now. Grateful, yes … happy that we weren’t affected too much, definitely. But I cannot push myself to feel a deep sense of loss or sympathy for many people right now.
Maybe because there were no casualties among my family, friends and colleagues. Sure they lost property - several had their cars underwater for several hours which will necessitate repairs; others had appliances and furnishings inundated and unrepairable; others lost mementoes, family heirlooms and clothes.
But they are alive - and more than grateful for the fact.
I stand around and listen and am struck by one thing - everyone comments on how swiftly and how high the floodwaters went. Also, for many of them, floods like this are a distant memory - it may have happened when they were kids, decades ago but it never went this bad. They all had to agree that they were caught unprepared - but then again, who can prepare for a disaster such as this?
Many have the same comment - “there were never any floods in our area! Over there, yes, but here?” Or those few who experience flooding on a more or less regular basis - “the water never went *that* high!” Like the Tireboy owners (above) - they knew the area was prone to flooding so they build some elevation to their location; at the same time, they had contingency plans in place: if the place starts flooding, jack the cars up and get everyone to the second floor of the building. There was no way they could have expected or planned for the water to reach *that* high!
They can only be grateful that there were no casualties among families and friends - the attitude seems to be that property can be restored, appliances replaced and mementoes or memories (in albums, photos,and keepsakes) will be replaced with new and better memories. “Things” can be replaced - lives lost are gone with only memories left and even these will fade with time.
As for me?
I’m grateful I didn’t have to go through all that the others did except to spend a few hours worrying about them until the word came down that they were safe. Battered and wet, in some cases, but alive and well.
In the end, I have a little bit more to be grateful for.
And that would be enough.
LiveJournal Tags: typhoon,Ketsana,Ondoy,Araneta Avenue,Tireboy,floods